


A Four Part Story

by rotrude



Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: Alcohol, F/M, M/M, Mourning, mild drugs use, original character's death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-03-20
Updated: 2012-03-20
Packaged: 2017-11-02 06:40:03
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 14,522
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/366057
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rotrude/pseuds/rotrude
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Written for 's prompt Modern AU, love triangle, Gwaine wants who he can't really have, inspired by The Heartbreaks - Jealous, Don't You Know for the leap day quest at Gwaine_quest.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Four Part Story

**Author's Note:**

> Parts 1, 3 and 4 were kindly beta'd by hardticket. Part 2 was equally kindly beta'd by asya_ana

**Part One: Summer Bonfire Night**

The bonfire flames danced, flickered and crackled, leaping up towards the night sky, paler at the edges. At their heart their colour was more intense, a deep red like a broken heart. 

The smoke was blowing towards him, both acrid and oddly balmy. Someone must have used fresh branches redolent with sap and put them on the flames to get a blaze that would last till dawn. 

“It won't cover the smell of weed, you know,” he told Will, who was sitting next to him on a log, another reject of this night of revelry.

“Don't care, mate,” Will told him, head lolling sideways. “Look at the pretty shapes in the fire.”

“You're stoned,” said Gwaine, scratching distractedly at his chin.

“Yeah, and that's fucking brilliant too.”

After taking a big, healthy swig, Gwaine put the can of beer down between his feet. It sank in the soft sand, lumpy grains sticking to its base. As long as he wasn't drinking sand mixed with beer, Gwaine reckoned it was all right. 

Sighing, he lifted his head just as Merlin steamed past him, jeans rolled up so his thin but wiry calves showed, big feet buried in the sand. He cut an odd portrait of the vulnerable, unshakeable and fey. 

Gesturing wildly with one hand, he was dragging Freya by the other, herding her towards one of the seats still available round the fire. Buried under the crinkles at their corners, his eyes looked small, the colour of the iris unrecognisable, but he looked content and that brought a smile, quickly hidden behind a cupped hand, to Gwaine's lips. 

Sliding across the log, Gwaine pushed Will down further down it. Will went down like a domino piece, falling off his perch, kicking his legs and swearing like a sailor.

When he heard the noise made by Will's theatricality, Merlin's head whipped towards them. He must have seen that Will had wound up on the ground, one leg up in the air, the other stretched limply before him. Shoulders subtly quivering with repressed mirth, he bent down to murmur something in Freya's ear. In return, Freya elbowed him, but she moved over towards Gwaine and Will.

Shaking his head without hiding his bright grin, Merlin plodded over too.

Gwaine smacked his dry lips together, swiping his thumb under his ear as if he had a collar to fix. He twisted his mouth and the clicked his tongue on the roof of his mouth, making sure he was watching the play of the flames and his mates dancing in the background, eyes on the glow of the bonfire painting odd shapes across their faces. 

A cool breeze blowing out of the sea whipped up sparks that rained close to Gwaine's hand. Shoulders going from lowered to raised, Gwaine counted to ten, heard Will mumble something under his breath that might or mightn't have made sense, and shifted, resting one leg across the other and putting his hand around his ankle, tapping his finger against the vein that throbbed above the bone.

Someone laughed and toasted the others. “To summer's end and new beginnings.”

And nothing else happened, not even after Freya had righted Will and then given up on keeping him upright after he'd buried his face in her flowery dress.

Gwaine cocked his head just a little to the side, checking the spot Merlin had been occupying a few moments ago, up on the beach where you could see the bright lights of the coastal road and hear the dull noise of engines rumbling past.

And a little off from where Merlin should have been, Arthur Pendragon stood, road lights washing him out and making him look like a ghost. 

Arthur was in his shirt sleeves, a white crisp button down that seemed almost translucent when bathed in the light from Route 20 singled him out as someone who didn't belong to this particular party. His shirt was open at the neck; more than three buttons were undone so that a pale sliver of skin stood out. A dark suit jacket slung over his shoulders and patent leather loafers completed the look of affluent nonchalance. As his cuff started edging down his wrist and towards his hand, Arthur pulled his sleeve up to his elbow with a quick, distracted, but assured gesture.

His cuff didn't slip down his wrist again and even if it had Gwaine wouldn't have noticed, for he was watching Merlin wade in the sand up to Arthur. 

Merlin stopped a few steps short of Arthur's position, saying nothing. He tilted his head instead in that way of his that made him look like a curious stray cat, and though Gwaine couldn't see his expression, he could imagine it. He could imagine the turned up corner of his lips. He could see in his mind's eye the self-deprecating, ironic eyebrow that would climb up his forehead; could just picture the eyes brimming over with every single feeling of his and getting wider, the expression in them softer as his gaze lingered on the object of his regard. Even though he couldn't see those things, Gwaine did spot the little shoulder raise that wasn't really a shrug. 

He did also notice how Merlin held his thumb under his curled over fingers, unknowingly pitted for a fight. He probably didn't even realise how his stance looked.

When Arthur's lips turned up in a half smile, Gwaine might have punched Pendragon, for Merlin's fingers relaxed. He bounded over to Arthur in great leaps, raising sand as he went. He didn't hug Arthur though. The both of them stood there, Arthur with his head cocked to the side, his watch glinting in the moonlight, Merlin with his chest heaving as if he'd run a great race.

Arthur dropped his jacket then, to let it become a dark speck on the colourless sand. Unmindful of his loss, he nodded over his shoulder at the slope that led back towards the road.

Merlin looked at the spot indicated, said something Gwaine couldn't hear – was glad he didn't hear – and moved.

At which point, Will straightened out with an involuntary jerk, distracting Gwaine from his observations. 

“There, there,” said Freya, West Country accent rolling off her tongue like shards of glass, stormy seas and green meadows. “It's just a dream.”

When Gwaine looked back towards Merlin and Pendragon, they were both gone.

Gwaine kicked his can; beer spilling on the sand and making it look like a compact polished mirror. He cursed, slipped his shoes on and ran, kicking up sand.

“Gwaine!” a girl's voice called after him. It might have been Freya, who was in a prime position to notice his reaction, or Mithian, who was more observant than any girl he'd ever known. “Gwaine, come back. Come on.”

A few timbers stuck upright in the sand around the old pier that jutted out to sea like a skeletal arm trying to reach out for the moon. The old wobbly wooden shack, rotten paddles still propped up against one of its sides, still stood squat if not solid in the corner eked out of the slope that led back to the N20's shoulder. Over the year’s bamboo sticks and grass had grown over everywhere, making it impossible to sprint fast, windflowers and shaking grass blades whispering grey in the night.

Though Gwaine hadn't overtaken them, he could hear them.

“Arthur.” That was Merlin, soft, low, awed. Awed as he never sounded unless he was speaking to lucky sod Arthur Pendragon. 

Arthur didn't say anything and Gwaine found he'd stopped moving as he anticipated the answer to a conversation that had begun somewhere else, before the immediacy of the now, a conversation he didn't know the particulars of but could guess the deep meaning behind anyway. 

Arthur's chuckle was distinctive. Like Merlin's it was self-deprecating. Unlike Merlin's there was a note of pride in it, as if by laughing at the world or himself he could anticipate and stave off any unwanted attack aimed at his underbelly. “I didn't know what to do about you.”

“There's nothing you have to do about me,” Merlin said, the delivery was short, as if he'd rushed the words out for fear of how they might sound, how telling they might be. For all that he wore his heart on his sleeve, for all that Merlin took you into his heart and gave you the keys to it, he could keep secrets like the best of them. Except this wasn't a secret to anybody with eyes to see and ears to ear. “I never said anything.”

“No,” Arthur agreed, clipped. Gwaine raised a fist. He didn't know what he wanted to do with it, what good it could have done since he was basically too far away from them to do more than eavesdrop, but the instinct couldn't be curbed and it made him feel better. As if he could potentially do something about Arthur's words, as if he could stomp over the coldness aimed at someone who deserved everything -- nothing short of the impossible – and make things right. And it was better than lashing out and making more noise, revealing his presence. 

“Always there, Merlin,” said Arthur contemplatively. “Never owning up to your needs.” 

The choked noise that came from Merlin made Gwaine nearly bend in two, as if he'd been run through his stomach. And, all right, some of it was pure bile, climbing up his throat and making his mouth taste like vomit, but part of it was sheer instinctive reflex, like solidarity experienced in fear of expected hurt.

“I don't?”

“What, Merlin?” said Arthur. “Are you telling me that you don't need?” There was a thud, as if someone had backed someone else against a hard surface. 

Gwaine was a step away from making a fool of himself and barging in. For a moment he contemplated going there, hitting Arthur and pointing out to Merlin how lacking Arthur was; how he fell short as to what made you worthy of devotion. 

For a few instants he cast himself in the role of the hero he'd never been. And if his positive traits, stood out because of a lie, then he could still be petty and rejoice in his victory. Rejoice in being the one who was easy for once. 

“I'm telling you that I'm happy to be by your side, whatever happens next, however you want to take me.”

Gwaine closed his eyes and the world with them. 

“You're my best friend.”

Merlin's sigh was carried by the wind. “I'll always be that.”

“You're the only one,” said Arthur. “The only one I can really call friend.” The tone of Arthur's voice was so different from his usual balanced one that Gwaine took a few steps forward almost involuntarily.

“I'm glad to be,” Merlin said. “But, Arthur, you're definitely not alone.”

“Shut up, Merlin.” The phrase might have been dismissive but Merlin's laughter was fresh and free of any burden, as if Arthur's wording was a call back to a mutual past Gwaine wasn't aware of. 

When Gwaine, moved on by the kind of curiosity that makes sinners of us all, rounded the corner, he was rewarded with the kind of sight only those who've kept on straying are gifted with.

Arthur was smiling, lips rounded in a soft curve that looked as spacey as Willa’s inane stoned grin; his hand was on Merlin's throat, his thumb under his chin, stroking, soft and gentle as you'd never think Arthur Pendragon could bring himself to be. 

When Arthur and Merlin kissed, Merlin's head thrown back, fleshy sounds carried by the wind, hand racking under clothes and tearing at them, Gwaine knew it was time to go.

He retreated noiselessly. His legs feeling like tree stumps, rigid, heavy and hard to move. His thoughts were on a loop and he didn't know how long it took him to get back to the bonfire and his friends – Merlin's friends.

Before he could trudge back to his spot and ask someone to pass him the booze, he caught the tail end of Freya's, “So since he's come back from New York, they're finally getting together.”

“Well,” said Gilli in a considering tone, “now he's burnt his bridges with Pendragon senior.”

Gwaine sank next to Will and Freya. “Pass the vodka, man,” he said, not caring who put two and two together as long as they didn't tell Merlin. Since they hadn't told Arthur, he thought he was safe.

With the glacial directness of those who're out of it, Will said, “Wow, you look like absolute shit, my lad.”

Freya jabbed Will in the midriff in a way that would have hurt if he wasn't thoroughly caned. “Pass the bottle,” Gwaine insisted. 

His mates refused. Great mates they were, “What? I'm the most sober around you. I only had two beers.”

“That's because you had to drive Meeerlin,” said Will.

“Well, now that's seen to,” said Gwaine, jaw ticking. 

Mithian got to her feet and put a hand on his chest. “I just don't think tonight's the night, you know.”

Gwaine pushed her away, not so strongly that she'd lose her balance but enough so that she'd step back. “Well, alright,” he said more petulantly that he had at any time since he got out of his teens, “have it your way. I'm heading home.”

Not heeding the chorus of protest, Gwaine picked up his jacket, pulled the zip up to his chin, and picked his way to the spot where he'd left his bike.

By the time he dove nose first in his pillow, it was five o'clock in the morning and dusty sun motes were skimming across the blade of sun-light that filtered through the heavy curtains. 

The sheets were starched, unwrinkled and he was alone on the big, wide bed.

 

**Part Two: Merlin**

 

She gave him a lap-dance him at the Nite Harbour until he was hard. 

She drew circles on him, keeping her back arched, her toes turned out. She was right on top of him, teasing his cock. She bent her knees and ground down, just enough to make him feel her, to make his hips strain and the sweat break on his skin like dew on a branch after a frosty night. Then she was up again, like a little dream of things that could be beautiful. 

She kept on swaying her hips, dancing, working him, her hair brushing against his arms.

“You're brilliant, Nat,” he slurred. “You're fucking brilliant.” 

And she was; he slipped a fiver under her red and black garter, where black lace whorls lapped at her milky white skin, just under the little, budding rose stitched to her costume. The charcoal feathers in her flapper's headband tickled at his nose and made him scrunch it up.

All the while she moved over him, like a siren.

When she turned, he could make out the knobs of her spine, standing out like shoals on the coastline, especially the top one at the base of her neck, and the bit of lace tied at her nape like bandoleers in the wind. With straight legs, she bent forward, looking back at him teasingly. 

She gave him a wink and nod andnd slapped her bottom, a sonorous smack that made him break into laughter.

“You're quite something,” he said, grabbing at her hip with one hand and slipping a fifty under the elastic holding up her knickers. 

Plucked eyebrow arched, she sucked on her index finger like a fifties pin-up girl, gently swaying over his crotch, opening her legs more and more. 

In this position her tight arse was pointed at him; brazen, round, pert. She shook it in time with the music, the little tassels belonging to her outfit rustling and jingling in a cacophony that didn't match the rhythm of her movements. 

“Thank you,” she breathed out.

Not done working him, making him feel as though he could come then and there if only she was real -- this was real – she bent one knee to the side and straightened the other out. 

She slid her hand up the long, sinuous length of leg she had stretched out, making him wonder how it was at all possible that the shape of her hand could remind him of Merlin's when the proportions were all wrong. 

Hers was smaller and manicured; decidedly feminine, no trace of Merlin's bitten-to-the-quick nails or wiry wrists. Yet the way her long fingers tapered was eerily reminiscent of his. 

His hands trembled as he slid her another fiver, this one finding a home under the glittering strap of her push-up bra.

Then, quite abruptly, Gwaine's mobile rang, and he cursed himself for not turning it off. 

Grunting out his annoyance, he made as if to get up and Nat got off him. “Got to take this,” he said. “For people to call at this hour, it must be important.”

She pouted but nodded, moving over to the stage, thighs a spectacle of smooth beauty.

He gave her his back, got to his phone and pushed the green button, unable to read the number on the diplay because of the dimmed lights of the club. He pressed a finger to the drum of his other ear. “Hello, whoever you are, I can't hear you. Music's too loud.”

Realising this was something that would never change as long as he remained inside, he staggered out of the club on legs that felt like those of a sailor at sea. 

He made it out into the night, the air sharp and biting, like a slap to the senses. It brought him round and wakened him if somewhat roughly. Pity that. He'd quite enjoyed his inability to focus. “Yeah, hello,” he said to make it clear he was still there.

“Gwaine,” his mother said, “I--”

“You never call.” His tone was clipped, perspiration breaking on his forehead. “What's happened?”

“Your father.”

Gwaine felt his legs go a little funny under him. “Yeah? What about him?”

“I’m afraid that—”

Given the ominous tone, Gwaine crumpled down, winding up sitting crossed-leg on the pavement, drunk businessmen making detours around him to get to the club's back door. “Dad, yeah, you were saying...” He pressed the heel of his hand against his forehead.

“He passed, Gwaine,” she said, the reproach only minimal in her voice. “Can you come back? Just this once. Whatever you think of us, he'd have wanted you to.”

Gwaine hung up, giving no answer because he had no answer. 

He raked a hand through his hair, thumped a fist down on his thigh, then went and speed dialled Merlin, fingers clumsy on his mobile phone's tiny keypad. 

“Merlin,” he said, his voice not quite sounding like his. “I'm sorry to be interrupting a night of crazy sex with your patrician lover boy, but... Merlin, my dad died. I...”

“Where are you?” Merlin's voice wafted over. “Gwaine, where are you? I'm coming over there.”

**** 

Four shots of vodka later, Gwaine saw Merlin standing at the club’s entrance. “The cavalry,” he told Nat, who was straddling the chair opposite him, chin on its back, intent on watching him like a hawk.

Gwaine waved at Merlin. 

When Merlin got within grabbing distance, Gwaine hooked an arm round his neck and pulled him down. 

Slobbering against Merlin's cheek, he told Nat, “This is my best friend, Merlin. Merlin's sure to act like a boy scout and try to rescue you.”

“He's been like this for the better part of an hour,” said Nat. The traitor. “He was a little pissed before too, but--”

Merlin gnawed on his lip and raked his eyes over Gwaine from head to foot. “Yeah, I can see that.” He sidled closer, sneaked a hot hand between the chair and Gwaine and tried to heave him upright. 

“Come on, Gwaine,” Merlin said, “a little help, please.”

“If you ask nicely,” Gwaine said, turning his head so that his lips kept brushing the corners of Merlin's mouth. “I'll give you the sun and moon and stars, if you ask nicely.”

Merlin huffed and tugged so hard he got Gwaine up. Then Gwaine reeled and slammed right into his side. “Sorry.” He laughed, short and like a bark. “Sorry.”

“Gwaine,” said Merlin as if his name had a thousand meanings.

Gwaine bowed his head and rested it on Merlin's shoulder. 

“Let me get you out of here,” said Merlin, directing his steps towards the door marked Exit only to be stopped by Nat saying, “His car's parked on the other side, close to the back.”

“Okay, thank you for watching over him,” he told Nat. “I’m sure making sure he’s all right isn’t in your job description.”

“I’d do this and more for Gwaine.”

“Loyal customer?” Merlin asked, as if Gwaine wasn't there. Gwaine could have told him, but he didn't, breathing the smell of Merlin in. 

The curve of Nat's lips was soft and generous when she said, “Yeah, and a nice one.”

Merlin gave her an acknowledging head tilt and muttered, “Good to know.” Then turning all business, he steered him to the door opposite, negotiating the rows of chairs and the area the stage butted around. 

He walked Gwaine out, right where Gwaine had been when he'd taken the call. 

Readjusting, Merlin placed his shoulder under Gwaine's arm and shepherded him down the pavement, round the plaza and towards the Nite Harbour's staff car park. 

Without asking, he searched Gwaine's pockets and didn't even tell Gwaine to shut up when Gwaine started on the lewd jokes about searching his trousers. 

His patience rewarded by finding Gwaine's keys, Merlin said, “Thank God you didn't get here on your bike.”

“I can still give you those lessons,” offered Gwaine.

“Not in this state.” Merlin opened the passenger's door and ducked Gwaine into the car, his hand shielding Gwaine's head so he wouldn't bump it.

The street lights blinked on and off like those of a Christmas tree, traces of the city's habitation almost wiped away at this hour. 

Gwaine spotted a girl waddling on towering heels, a guy running acrossdown the pavement like an action film hero rushing off to save the day, and a hobo huddled on the steps leading up to the colonnaded lobby that gave access to a lofty bank. He snorted at the irony conjured by the last image. He didn’t have much time to cosider the effects the financial sway of big institutions had on the life of an average poor sod, for he was lulled into drowsinees by the car's steady motion. 

Because Merlin drove steadily, his foot even on the accelerator, never angry on the clutch, fingers smooth around the gear lever. 

Gwaine idly wondered if he was like the clutch in Merlin's life 

“Am I the clutch, Merlin? You know, you need it to work, to coax it, but it’s the accelarator that’s fun. I want to be the accelarator, Merlin.”

Merlin was as gentle with things as he was with people. Watching out for Gwaine’s safety like the good Samaritan he was, Merlin kept his eyes on the road, fingers stiffening around the wheel, knuckles standing out, a tracery of blue veins cobwebbing his skin. “Gwaine, you're making no sense. Let me get you home, okay?” 

Gwaine wanted to explain, philosophise in the dead of night until Merlin got him, until Merlin had the key to his thought processes and every nook and cranny of the prison that was himself. 

But then he realised that Merlin would find things about Gwaine that he'd think unsavoury at the very least, secrets and lies Gwaine would lay at his feet if Gwaine had the courage to show them to him, had the courage to fail the test and show himself wanting. If he dared to risk scaring Merlin away.

Gwaine rubbed the side of his nose with the flat of a finger, opening his mouth to expound his theory on friendship, but the car had rolled to a halt. 

Gwaine blinked and looked around, distinguishing the telltale crooked tree that grew before his block of flats. “Oh, we're here.” 

He ducked his head to look at his building, at the cement façade he'd once thought of as an apt ‘fuck off’ to the city, and was hit by nausea at having sunk so low. 

It was real reverberating sickness, bile climbing up in his throat till he had to shoulder open the door and retch the vodka he had consumed right into the gutter.

He heard the thud made by the car door being closed, the serrated clomp of Merlin's steps on the pavement, and felt his cool hand on his forehead. 

Gwaine looked the other way, refusing to meet Merlin's eye and see the pity in them, a well of friendliness and concern Gwaine would never have wanted to evoke just on account of how pathetic he was.

He wiped at his mouth with his sleeve, darted a glance further down the road, and acted as though Merlin wasn't there, wasn't seeing this.

Merlin, though, seemed to want none of that.

He hauled Gwaine up, shut the door behind him, and walked him towards the building, Gwaine tottering against him, Merlin's sharp hips bumping against Gwaine's sides, something that would have made Gwaine half hard on any ordinary day. Not tonight.

“I've got it from here.” Gwaine swallowed hard, the after-taste of bile in his throat. He pointed at the lift. “Can get myself home all on my lonesome.”

“No way.” Merlin dragged him by the sleeve and called the lift, pushing Gwaine into it once the doors had slid open with a clank. 

Gwaine slumped against the furthest wall, the cold glass of the full-length mirror solid under his fingers as they jingled and tapped a rhythm. They hit the fifth floor.

Merlin drove him on by the collar, pointing him towards his own door. 

“Hey,” said Gwaine, summoning the ghost of his own voice, “if you want a pet, you should get one. Arthur not enough?”

They stood leaning against Gwaine's door, Merlin's eyes so very blue in the predawn light coming in through the window pane that Gwaine gulped in air at the beauty of him, Gwaine's own hair stuck to his forehead in wet strands that made him want to pull at them till they were gone, so he could gaze at Merlin, vista unimpeded.

“Don't be like that,” Merlin said, opening the door for him. “Come on.”

Insistently, Merlin prodded Gwaine into his own bedroom, pulled his clothes off him with an efficiency that made Gwaine's nascent grin shrink into a smirk. “We should call Arthur,” he said, tilting his head back so he had a view of the damp stain on his ceiling. “Make this a threesome.” 

“Yeah, yeah,” Merlin said, getting Gwaine's belt off him before pushing him onto the bed to work Gwaine's shoes off and yank at his trousers. 

Gwaine let him, scooting up the bed to lie down. 

Sighing at this parody of his fantasies, Gwaine rolled onto his side and closed his eyes, officially announcing that he was closing for business. 

He had nothing more to say that he wouldn't twist into cutting remarks anyway, the sharp blades of his words something he still had the decency to save Merlin from. 

Like a ripple on the ocean, the mattress dipped. 

Gwaine peered out of semi-closed eyes to find a shoeless, jacketless Merlin lying by his side, face smushed into Gwaine's pillow, smelling like himself and radiating warmth like a minor sun. “Not leaving you here like this,” he said, resting his head on his hand and closing his eyes. “Sleep,” he added, “you need it more than me.”

It was the devil that made him do it or maybe he could blame the alcohol still in his system, but when he blinked his eyes open what must have been a few hours later, the bed washed in sunlight like a golden sheen, he leant over and fit his lips to Merlin’s, testing their softness, waking Merlin by slipping his tongue inside his mouth, a gentle stroke, threading his fingers in Merlin's hair and clutching hard, like he wanted to stay.

It might have lasted the span of a few heartbeats, but Merlin returned the kiss, lips gliding softly across Gwaine's, his tongue in Gwaine's mouth, sleek and tentative, warming Gwaine from the belly up, getting his heart to swell and his cock to twitch. 

And then it was over, the taste of him on his tongue, Gwaine refusing to ask who Merlin had thought he was kissing. 

Avoiding Merlin’s wide, startled eyes, Gwaine sat up, thoughts spinning in one hundred different directions at once, deliberately refusing to think too much about the erection Merlin was sporting, thinking it nothing more than morning wood.

It was hard not to think about how easy it'd be to make a thing of it, to pull Merlin close and seduce him with his body till they both forgot everything. Until Merlin forgot Arthur and his stupid devotion to him and Gwaine forgot about his father. But he refused to; refused to hurt Merlin more than he'd already had by being a shitty friend. 

“I'll make you some tea,” Merlin said, pushing onto his feet and ambling barefoot into Gwaine's kitchen, a mockery of intimacy. 

Gwaine sank back on the bed, thinking his father had been right about him, so damn right. It would be funny to finally tell him, “Hey, old man, turns out you had me sussed out.”

Merlin came back with a tall coffee that smelled charred and tasted worse, a glass sizzling with effervescent aspirin and a small smile Gwaine didn’t want to see. 

Gwaine gulped down the coffee first and then the aspirin to wash away the taste.

Hiding a wince, he ducked into the shower, the jet of water battering some sense right into him. 

When he walked back into his bedroom, naked, Merlin was on the phone with Arthur. 

He was sitting on the lowest of the two raised steps leading into the lounge. “All right,” he said. “I had to tell you. No, no, not for that. It's not me getting back at... No, Arthur.” 

A powerful lung-rattling sigh seemed to shake Merlin's ribcage, his shoulders curved as if he was curling his body around the phone and in on himself. “Arthur--” 

Merlin seemed to be interrupting Arthur's flow of words. “Do you trust me?” 

Merlin chuckled, shoulders relaxing. “No, not with anything that sensational, you prat. I meant, me, me trying to do the best for everybody. Do you do that?”

There was a pause. “That's not true and you know it better than anyone. It's just... so sodding wrong. Oh all right, thank you. I'll be calling you later, bye, Arthur.”

When he made it back into Gwaine's bedroom, Merlin didn't even bat an eyelash at his nakedness. He said, “I'll drive you to your father’s place. You're not in a state to.”

“Merlin, no.”

Gwaine rummaged a drawer for a pair of boxers and put them on. 

“You were off your face last night.” 

Gwaine's search for clothes continued. “That's often the case with me and I'm sober enough now.”

“Might be,” Merlin said, eyeing him speculatively. “Still not letting you go alone. Not leaving you alone to cope with this.”

Gwaine drummed his fist on his chest of drawers, the sound surprising even him. “Stop being so nice, Merlin. You're winning no prizes here. Arthur might have conditioned you into becoming a bend-over-backwards doormat, but I don't need you.”

Merlin flinched, hard, a light going out in his eyes. Nonetheless he reared his shoulders out and held his fists by his side. “I won't let you go alone whatever you throw at me, okay, Gwaine?”

Merlin wouldn't be dissuaded. 

 

***** 

When the house came into view, Merlin cursed, and said, “It's a palace.”

Gwaine pushed his shoulders up to his ears, letting the wind play in his hair, engine rumbling beneath his seat. “My father had a flair for the dramatic.”

“Yeah,” said Merlin between his teeth. “Funny you didn't say.”

Gwaine was further betrayed by his father's staff, men and women gathered before the main entrance, framed by Corinthian pillars and stark marble. 

They bowed their heads in salute, wished him welcome back and my-lorded him till Gwaine's shoulders rippled with the urge to shake all hands clasps off. He asked of Yeats, the butler, where his mother was.

“I'm afraid grief overwhelmed her, my lord,” Yeates said. “The doctor's been and gave her a prescription to help her cope. She's sleeping now.”

The easy way out, of course. Gwaine stuffed his fists into his pockets and scurried past the ranks of servants like a rabbit honing in on his hole, Merlin hurrying behind him, a carry-all slung over his shoulder. 

“Gwaine!” he shouted after him, his voice echoing and bouncing off the walls, ricocheting around the marble stairwell and coming back to Gwaine amplified, “Gwaine, stop...”

Gwaine did because Merlin sounded hurt and confused and Gwaine could never abide the former. “I can promise you Yeats has given you a nice room.” He summoned a grin like a puppet on stage. “How do you fancy a four-poster?”

Merlin climbed the stairs to join Gwaine on the mezzanine. “Why didn't you tell me? Did you think I'd try to use you?”

Gwaine's face crumpled, his fingers dug into the knots of Merlin's shoulder. “Never that.” He angled himself so he was standing closer to Merlin, breathing into his neck. “It was me. This—” He flicked a thumb at the place... “Was never me.”

“I thought you were as broke as me...” Merlin trailed off, sniffed. Gwaine shook his head over a choked chuckle. Only Merlin... 

Merlin preferred him broke and normal and approachable. Instead of a powerful someone who could smooth things for him. And after all he had the hang of it. Better off broke than rich and fucked up. “I'll show you to your room.”

Merlin followed him, meek and silent like never before. They parted ways over the carved door to Merlin's room.

They saw each other again over dinner, Gwaine deliberately leaving the chair at the head of the table vacant, as if a silent silent ghost was occupying it. 

His mother joined them after the starters, drawn and proper, dark gouges under her eyes marking her mourning. 

Jabbing the spoon through the crumbly crust and into the browned apples, thick juice seeping up, she said, “Are you planning to stay? Have you finally decided to come back?”

Gwaine threw black a glass of port. “I live in London now.”

His mother arched an eyebrow. “I thought your rebel without a cause days were over.” She resettled her napkin across her knees. “Evidently not.”

Gwaine didn't reply, the servants silent masks behind them, Merlin busy feigning interest in the glass stems.

“Is that where he lives? Is that why you're so fond of London nowadays?” she asked, stealing a glance at Merlin. “Is he your latest one?”

Gwaine thumped a hand on the table. “That's enough. Have a go at me,” he said, “but stop insulting Merlin!”

“That's all right,” Merlin said, darting glances at the door as if he thought it was the key to his personal safety “I'm not off—”

Gwaine spoke over him, “Because Merlin's too fine a person to put up with me and be insulted by you, mum.” He stood up, the butler jumping after him to rescue the fallen napkin. “I'm going to the pub.”

Merlin and his mother gaped after him.

Gwaine spent the night at the Rising Sun, Linnet still serving behind the bar. She gave him a smile, and said, “Long time no see.” 

Gwaine put a few more drinks back. 

Hours later, she supported him all the way to her room.

She was soft and her breasts supple, skin tasting like salt as he slipped his tongue down her chest and nuzzled at her stiffening nipples. 

She gripped him tight when he entered her, warm and wet, clinging to him, heels digging in his calf as she spurred him on and arched beneath him.

As he plunged deep, she gasped into his ear and pushed back against him, scratching at him, tugging on his hair. 

He fucked her as she asked him to, long and hard, and relentless, till he forgot his name and could only zero in on the pores of her skin, the swell of her breasts, and the muscles clutching his cock tight, spasming when he took firm hold of her hips and slipped a finger inside her alongside his cock, the base of his wrist pushing against the swell of her clit.

She was a screamer; his hips leaped when he thrust into her one last time, coming in spurts.

**** 

His father's funeral was the next day and Gwaine still smelt like sex and a night spent at the pub. 

His mother glared at him; the servants kept their opinions to themselves, mindful of who held the purse's strings now. His father's friends shook their heads as they told tales involving the dearly departed, sharing memories, peeking at Gwaine out of slitted eyes, murmurs of disapproval like nails on a blackboard.

The service was long and dry as dust; the priest's voice one lilting monotone.

Gwaine's father had never believed in God. Gwaine said as much when he was told to speak over the bier, his last duty as a respectful son.

“Because, God, but my father was a heathen.”

Mouths gaped, heads bobbed up in shock, like a retriever's sniffing new prey.

“I don't really think he believed in the immortality of the soul either,” he said just as the church's massive door cracked open and Arthur slid in, stopping short at Gwaine's words – odd, he should know about fathers who shouldn't be fathers. 

Arthur walked up the nave and took his place in the pews.

Gwaine wiped at his nose with his cuff. “My father believed in privilege and his right to stand a head taller than the rest, and in fucking the servants, but... God, he was my father...” His voice cracked, his vision got blurry and Merlin....

Merlin darted up to the pulpit and broke him out of the church, led him into the tiny garden behind the chapel the priest used. Pink flowers were blooming, sun shining in his hair, a gentle breeze whipping at his face and reddening his cheeks.

He was bloody marvellous.

Merlin was a good man. He let Gwaine wrap his arms around his middle and wet his shoulders and neck with tears. 

Let Gwaine sob and curse and groan, and hurl insults at the heavens. Till Gwaine calmed down, chest still shaking against Merlin's, fingers passing over the wet spot Gwaine had left on Merlin's jacket at shoulder level.

Gwaine husked, “Thank you.” 

And then Arthur was there, a hand on Merlin's shoulder, a smile flashing across his lips, which was then soon gone. “Be there for him,” he told Merlin, face serious again, all the worry lines back in place. “Merlin, it's okay.”

Gwaine didn't ask: he was trying too damn hard to get a hold of himself so Arthur wouldn't know, so Arthur wouldn't be forced to act like the chivalric person Merlin believed he was and Gwaine hoped he wasn't. For their collective sakes.

Gwaine laughed.

 

**Part Three: The Consolation of Sex**

 

These being the perks of having become the new owner, Gwaine found Arthur a room at his father's, no prior notice needed. 

After all, Arthur couldn't possibly be made to drive home this late without being given the chance to sleep his exhaustion off. 

Gwaine wasn't about to cause the man's death by turning him out and making him motor all the way back to London after he'd driven all the way up to attend his father's funeral. 

He had only wished him dead figuratively and when he was at his maudlin worst.

Dinner that night was even worse than dinner on the night before. His mother was silent but for fawning praise of Arthur. “Your father is an admirable person, Arthur. His charities...”

Arthur rolled the wine in his mouth before visibly swallowing. “Those were my mother's. He just keeps signing the cheques.”

“That's still admirable.” She turned to Gwaine. “We should do what the Pendragons do, too.”

Gwaine tinkered with his fork, polishing it on his trousers, and looking for his reflection in the shaft. “Yeah, that's very genteel.”

All conversation stopped, his mother's cheeks hollowing. 

Merlin said, “Could anyone pass me the salt?” and that was that.

The after-dinner was even more painful, with Gwaine's mother questioning Arthur about Ygraine, which made Arthur pale, fuss with the knot of his tie and stammer terse replies that even Gwaine could see were torturing him. 

When Gwaine's mother left early, Gwaine sighed in relief, but when Merlin went too, ostensibly to phone his boss in Hove to tell him that he needed another free day for a family emergency he stiffened all over again.

Joy of joys, he'd been left to entertain Arthur Pendragon.

He and Arthur sat opposite each other in perfect silence, fire blazing behind Gwaine, an ugly as fuck but likely valuable teapot on the table between them.

Unable to bear the absence of noise, Gwaine said, “Merlin shouldn't be making his boss angry on my account.”

Arthur shifted, armchair creaking when he moved. He propped his elbows on his knees and cradled his fingers together. “But Merlin's like that. If you told him that he needn't do it, he'd come up with a hundred and ten reasons why he should.”

Gwaine scratched at his beard.

“And to be frank, Gwaine, you're a mess.”

Gwaine laughed. “What do you care?”

Arthur let his gaze slip over Gwaine again, assessing him. “You and I aren't that dissimilar, you know.”

Gwaine mirrored Arthur's pose but shook his head. “We're nothing alike.”

“You're still angry with him--” 

Gwaine flicked at his nose with his thumb. “Yeah, yeah... but I never wanted his approval. I never let anyone suffer because I wasn't fulfilling his expectations...”

“Well, fuck'em and leave'em doesn't sound like a gentler approach...”

Gwaine's voice rose. “I didn't make them dance to my tune to prove they were worthy though.”

Arthur pursed his lips and nodded his head. “You're very defensive of Merlin....”

“Yeah,” said Gwaine, warming to his subject, “because he deserves it.”

Arthur shook with laughter, high pitched. “Merlin doesn't need anyone to defend him... But I'm glad you want to protect him. It's all right by me. You, on the other hand need someone to be there for you.”

“I don't.”

“Yeah, yeah,” said Arthur, his agreeing a counter offensive. There was a certain light in his eyes though that told Gwaine he knew what he was going on about. “You think you're unshakeable, unflappable. You're coming apart, Gwaine.”

Gwaine started upright.

Arthur raised his hand. “Merlin agrees.”

Gwaine looked instinctively at the door, as though expecting to see Merlin there, wearing his concerned, dewy expression. “I'm...”

“You can, you know.”

Gwaine felt sure he'd missed on an important part of this conversation. “Pendragon, you're talking in riddles.”

Arthur rose, put his hands in his pockets, crossed the room to Gwaine, bypassed him, picked up a log from the wicker basket and fed the flames in the fireplace. He was still bending over, a hand splayed over the marble frieze, when he said, “Merlin. Have sex with Merlin. It's what you've always wanted, isn't it?” 

Gwaine was assaulted by an avalanche of images; he pictured it, down to the most lurid detail, Merlin's body offered up to him, covered in sweat and Gwaine and come, cock turgid and mouth worked red with kisses. 

He stopped visualising it when he remembered who he was talking to – the man who had that from Merlin – and analysed what this all meant. “So you're pawning him off, like a thing?” 

He got into Arthur's face, backed him up against the fireplace, wanting to look Arthur in the eyes for this.

They were shuttered; beads of sweat were forming on his forehead. Gwaine had him by the lapels of his jacket. Arthur closed a hand around Gwaine's fistful of fabric and pushed his hands away. “You think I'd do this over his head?”

Gwaine didn't reply facts, feelings and impressions at war with each other. This made not a shred of sense.

Arthur's voice took on a gentle quality when he said, “I'd never do that to him.”

“Then why isn't he here, if he agreed?”

“He didn't agree,” said Arthur, locking eyes with Gwaine. “It was his idea in the first place.”

“Merlin would tell me... if he even...” There was no way he could finish that sentence. The implications went too deep; the assumptions he could make without knowing were too many. And one of them hurt too much for words. Because, why -- Christ why -- would you offer sex to someone unless...

“He'd do anything for you.” Arthur shoved Gwaine away, walking back to his armchair. In light of their new relative positions, Gwaine couldn't see Arthur face. “He'd... Of course he'd want to do it.”

“I don't want that kind of charity...”

“If you think that, then you don't know Merlin at all.”

“He doesn't get what--” 

He was abruptly cut off. “He's got a big heart but he's not naïve.”

“I--”

Arthur sank back into the armchair he'd previously vacated, both arms stretched along the armrest. “Take that chance.”

“He doesn't love me.”

It was Arthur's turn to study his hands and keep mum. 

Gwaine asked, “What about you two?”

Arthur looked up at that, fast. “Some things are between me and Merlin, but... You think I don't care, I know that. That's not... I'm not leaving you carte blanche. I'm not ceding the field.”

“How very medieval of you.”

“And I don't hate you, whatever you think of me.” He tapped a rhythm on the armrest, something quick and chopped. “I admire you even.” That was said with the utmost reluctance; as though Arthur had just swallowed a frog whole. “And I trust him. With everything I've got. So there's that.”

Gwaine would have never have believed this possible: to be standing there, having a heart to heart with Arthur Pendragon. “And if this is all true--” Gwaine tossed a hand about. “Why hasn't he told me instead of letting you do it?”

It was Merlin, standing half in, half out of the door, who answered. “Because I'm a coward.” 

****  
Two days later Merlin slipped into his room.

Gwaine felt Merlin's mouth fast and warm upon his and his hand about his neck. A sigh escaped him and he placed a trembling hand at Merlin's waist. A few seconds passed and Gwaine breathed him in. “Are you sure?” he croaked, voice a wreck, like a collection of shards under foot.

Merlin tipped his head back to let him read his face. “You still don't get it, do you?” he said.

That was nothing like the answer Gwaine wanted. He could not tell his heart what to do on the basis of that. “Merlin--” He cupped his face, thumb caressing Merlin's pointy chin.

“I'm sure,” Merlin said. “I'm sure or I wouldn't have said. Now if you don't want me or if you're mourning and don't feel like it. That's another matter--”

Gwaine moved his lips over Merlin's, hugging him close, then nosing the side of his face as he wrapped himself tightly around him. “No, I want you. You're out of your mind if you think I don't. Merlin... Merlin, you're--”

“Then let's.”

Merlin kissed him then, all on his own, his kiss deep and sure and playful, his tongue darting in and out of Gwaine's mouth, his mouth playing at the corners of Gwaine's, rubbing, getting caught between Gwaine's lips, soothing. 

Merlin tasted and smelt and felt exactly right. He sent Gwaine's heart beating too fast for his chest to bear, like it was an ache.

He made Gwaine clumsy, unable to negotiate buttons, stumbling as they waltzed to the bed. 

Gwaine just nuzzled at Merlin's neck, ran his hands all over his body, pushed against him, unable to put space between them even if it was needed to undress. He couldn’t take his mouth off him.

It was Merlin who pushed Gwaine's shirt off his shoulders and it was Merlin who smiled up at him and popped open the buttons of Gwaine's jeans. He put a kiss to Gwaine's neck for each button that went and drank Gwaine's hiss with his mouth the moment he started teasing Gwaine's cock.

Gwaine's hips searched for him, pushing into his hand as Merlin gripped him. 

Gwaine thought that he would have had questions for Merlin by now. Horrible questions like, do you do this to Arthur too? Are these the things you do with him or that he does to you? But none of that mattered right then; there wasn't much space for rational thought in his mind. 

There was only Merlin right there and then, only the quality of his skin, the creases around his mouth as he smiled, the hot points that were his fingers as they wrapped themselves around his cock, pulling, pulling, long and hard, old school way.

“Merlin--” Gwaine croaked when he found his hips were bucking and that he was panting hard. His mouth was hanging open; maybe it looked as though he was surprised and in a way he was. He’d never thought this would happen. Not after the night of the bonfire.

But it was real; Merlin was stripping him and Gwaine was losing control fast. He reached out and grasped onto Merlin's arms, stopping him. “I want more, Merlin.”

Merlin nodded, put a kiss behind his ear. He danced away, at least as far as he could without bumping into the bed. He lifted his tee off, letting it pool at his feet. He did it in a functional way, earnest, no big production. In the same understated way he kicked his shoes away and pushed down his jeans. 

Gwaine's heart double-thumped. “Let me,” he said, inching closer, settling his hands at Merlin's waist, hooking a finger around a frayed belt loop. He let out a breath, looking into Merlin's eyes and losing himself in them, so the moment would stay with him. 

He tugged down Merlin's jeans and pants in one move as Merlin laid himself down.

Naked, Merlin was nicely formed, lean, all angles. His torso slimmed down into pointy hips, his knees and elbows jutted out, and a healthy smattering of hair darkened his chest. His long, long legs were bent at the knee. His cock was stiffand dark pink. 

“You're such a beauty.”

Merlin laughed softly. “I'm not one of your girls, Gwaine.”

“No,” Gwaine choked out. “You're a gorgeous man.”

Gwaine stretched out beside Merlin on the bed; ran his thumb from his collarbone down to his navel. 

Merlin inhaled at the touch, belly sucked in. 

Gwaine lowered his head and took a nipple in his mouth, suckled on it like a babe, until it pebbled. 

He stroked Merlin's thigh, pushing it aside and mapped Merlin's body with his mouth, all the way down.

Drunk on having Merlin there, he mouthed and kissed the head of Merlin's cock, took it in, lapping at the slit. 

In response Merlin curled his fingers in his hair, arched up when Gwaine flicked his tongue over the skin near the top of his shaft. 

Encouraged, Gwaine swirled his tongue over the reddening head, holding Merlin's length cradled in his hand. Merlin tugged on his hair, sobbed out. 

When Gwaine went down on him properly, bobbing his head up and down and sucking like he meant business, Merlin moaned, the most vocal he’d been thus far. His whole body jerked spasmodically, rising up to fill Gwaine's mouth. 

Gwaine let up. “Not yet,” he said, stroking Merlin's knee. “I--” He pushed Merlin's legs apart and wider open, trying to tell him what he most wanted, what he'd never really much daydreamed about because it was so unattainable. 

He looked at the pattern of the eiderdown when he found he couldn't find the words to ask.

Breathing hard, pupils blown, Merlin grabbed him by the hair and took his mouth in a deep kiss that made Gwaine shake. “I want it,” he whispered in Gwaine's ear. “I want it too or I wouldn't be here. Stop thinking.” 

Gwaine nodded, sat up and leant over, getting lube and condoms from the overnight bag he'd left at the foot of the bed. 

He used the lube to work Merlin slick and open; he used his mouth too, sucking on his hole and wetting him around and inside it. Merlin's breathing pattern broke. He never shouted but he twitched; his muscles quivered. His body rose with every jab of Gwaine's tongue. His fingers curled around the sheets.

Judging him ready, Gwaine moved between his thighs, lifting one of his legs onto his shoulder. 

They shared a look then and Gwaine did nothing to hide how much this meant to him. 

He trembled when he pushed in, working himself inside Merlin inch by minuscule inch, asking in a feverish way whether Merlin was all right.

“Yeah.” Merlin sucked his lower lip in. “Yeah.”

Gwaine thrust in then, no longer capable of keeping his body's needs bottled in. 

Merlin was hot inside, the slide perfect with the amount of lube he'd used. More, he was the one Gwaine had always wanted; he was the one Gwaine had always thought of as someone that would never be his. Too nice, too kind. 

He sought Merlin's mouth as he worked himself in because he wanted nothing more than a kiss to make this as intimate as it could be, to have more of this flood of Merlin on the senses. 

But when he pistoned back in, he experienced a sudden surge of pleasure, searing him from tail bone to cock and making him almost black out it was so strong. 

Before he could rein it in, before he could do anything but ride it slack-mouthed, he'd come, not bringing Merlin off, just slumping on top of him like a selfish kid at his first try.

As soon as he'd recovered his breath, he did start jerking Merlin off, doing it in quick tugs aimed at giving back as soon as he could.

All flushed, Merlin stiffened and came, biting on his fist, painting Gwaine's knuckles in come.

When they'd cleaned up and got back on the bed, Merlin on his side, Gwaine belly up, Merlin said, “I didn't think it would be like this with you.” 

Gwaine rubbed at his ear, tugging on the lobe. “I'm sorry; I'm not usually like that...”

Merlin slid a hand between them, resting it on top of the mussed up sheets. “I thought you'd be all smooth performance. I thought you'd drive me crazy...”

“Merlin, I--” It was difficult coming up with words right now. If there was anyone, anyone in the whole world, he'd have wanted to please, that was Merlin. That he'd come short, taken only--

“That you'd do it like that, like you... care... I'm glad, Gwaine. I'm so glad we went there.”

Gwaine's jaw hung open. 

 

**** 

The one room the drive would be clearly visible from was the drawing room. But that was Gwaine's mother's eerie. To see this, however, he braved the threat of her possible presence. 

She wasn't in, so he sauntered up the window.

He pulled the heavy velvet curtain aside, a relic of his grandmother’s era, and watched Arthur walk Merlin to the car. 

They both had luggage to carry. Merlin had left a trolley on top of the stairs and went back to retrieve it, while Arthur stashed his carry-all into the boot. 

Merlin jogged back down the stairs, putting his trolley down to kiss Arthur's neck. They exchanged some words, a silent pantomime to Gwaine.

Arthur bobbed his head at something, face drawn into a serious expression. He placed an arm of Merlin's forearm, said something, eyebrows knitted into a frown.

A frown that smoothed when Merlin touched his fingers to it. A frown that changed into an easy, free smile. An unfettered childlike smile. Arthur and Merlin bumped shoulders. Merlin said something. Arthur threw his head back. Gwaine heard the laughter. Merlin shoulder-nudged him again and then they were running, chasing each other down the drive, heading for the fountain with the beheaded Jove. They splashed each other, raced each other, wound up kissing in the shadow of a thicket, up to their knees in grass that needed to be mowed.

Gwaine's mother appeared behind him as from out of nowhere. She brushed imaginary lint off his shoulder. “They have something...”

Gwaine pushed his lips together. “Is this the beginning of a cautionary tale?”

“No,” said his mother. “He loves him, I think.”

“Merlin is--”

It wasn't like his mother to make him finish. “Arthur. I'm talking about Arthur.”

“He's--”

“Someone you like, deep down. Or you wouldn't have let him stay.”

“I did because I felt guilty.”

Even if he wasn't looking at her, he knew his mother was scowling at his back. “That's not true...”

“Pendragon's not horrible,” he said grudgingly, hoping he'd be able to say that one day without any darkness working at his insides. “And I'm hurting them.”

Gwaine would freely admit being surprised by his mother's words. “I just don't want you to hurt yourself.”

She had heels on, he could hear their click as she glided out.

****  
 **Part Four: Menage à Trois >**

It was nine pm when Gwaine made it back to his flat. 

When he got back it was to find Arthur sitting on the last step giving onto the stairwell, his shoulders to the lift. He had shed his business suit armour and was wearing what looked like a washed out t-shirt and jeans. 

When, evidently alerted by the shudder and ding of the lift, he turned; Gwaine could see the rest of his outfit. His jeans were a large fit, hanging low on his hips and he was wearing canvas trainers that were suspiciously similar to a pair Merlin owned.

“To what do I owe the pleasure, your majesty?” Gwaine said, searching his pockets for his keys.

Arthur proffered a brown bag. “I bring wine.”

Gwaine opened the door and marched in, not closing it behind him. 

It was invitation enough. Arthur followed him inside.

Gwaine's eyebrows shot up. “As much as I appreciate the alcoholic bribe, the question stands.”

Arthur leant against the door. “I can't even share now?” He lifted the bottle by the neck.

“You've shared enough.” Gwaine bristled, moving over and slipping out of his jacket. He draped it over the back of the sofa, smoothed the leather out and looked up. 

Arthur's jaw had locked; his feet were placed wide apart and the grip he had on that bottle was clearly a death one. 

Gwaine could see that he was struggling for calm: his nostrils flared as if he was attempting to breathe out, and he shuffled, his pose less like one of a soldier on parade. “I know why you're doing this. I know and that's why I'm taking all this bullshit from you.”

Gwaine wheeled round and put his hands on his hips. “So this is a pity call.” It had to be. It was odd that it was Pendragon checking on him rather than Merlin, whom he'd have expected something like this from, but it was a let’s-make-sure-Gaines-doesn’t-do-anything-stupid visit all the same. “I see,” he said. “Merlin sent you.”

Gwaine's eyes swept across Arthur's face. Although the answer was clear enough in the way his eyes got larger for a second or two, Arthur kept quiet about it. 

“Now I'm wondering why he sent you. Why he's avoiding me.”

Arthur put the bottle down on a rickety side table. “Oh, but you're funny,” he said. “Merlin isn't avoiding you. Merlin's working like a pack mule because he took more than half a week off for you. If he so much as leaves the office he's been threatened with the sack--”

Gwaine felt a bit weaker about the knees. “I didn't--”

“You know,” Arthur said, “you say I'm selfish. And I have been at times. But you're in the race too.”

“Is he all right?” Gwaine grabbed at his hair, longer now than it had been for some time. “Is he...”

“He's tired: he falls asleep the moment he hits the pillow.”

Gwaine scrutinised his shoes.

“I've seen him once in over five days, I might add.” Arthur went back to the side table, got the bottle back and made himself cosy in the kitchen, finding, after some drawer rifling, a bottle opener. 

He opened the bottle with the know-how of someone used to uncorking fine vintages, threw the cork in the rubbish bin and poured the wine in the two glasses that sat on the counter. He picked one up, pushed the other down the bar surface, levelling an eyebrow at Gwaine.

Gwaine ambled over to him. Ignoring the glass, he lifted the bottle and drank from it, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand.

Arthur shook his head, but there was half a smile on his face. “He wants us to be friends.”

Gwaine was starting to see how the thought might have darted in Merlin's mind. “I see why he would.”

“And I mean to make him happy,” said Arthur. And that was so charged Gwaine didn't know what to say. He'd often accused Arthur of sitting back and having things fall into his lap. Maybe, just maybe, that wasn't so true. Perhaps, he was willing to work at his relationship with Merlin. This didn't make Gwaine feel too good. “What makes you think it would work?”

Arthur smiled: it wasn't a relaxed smile. There were lots of undercurrents to it and Gwaine couldn't pick them all out, but it was an honest smile. “Because you want him happy too. When you pull your head out of your arse and stop play-acting the poor misunderstood upper class rebel that is.”

“Said the man who likes conforming...”

“Unlike you,” said Arthur, surprisingly not baulking at the accusation, “I like not to do my best by the people around me.” He drank a careful sip. “So are you going to try?”

“To be your friend?”

“Not to bite my head off every time you see me.”

Gwaine scoffed. “You do the same.”

“No,” said Arthur. “I've mostly tried to ignore you. Ignore the fact Merlin has a love of you I can't do anything about.”

Gwaine's head whipped up. “He isn't in love with me.”

Arthur ran the tip of his finger around the rim of his glass, his eyes tracking the movement. “I don't know about that. And believe me, I'm an old fashioned man. I wouldn't have tried this if I didn't think it was the best option to make everybody as happy as possible.”

Gwaine took another direct swig from the bottle. He sniggered. “Now you'll tell me that the famed Arthur Pendragon was jealous.”

Arthur pushed up an eyebrow. “I was.”

“But you--”

“Told you to go for it?” asked Arthur. “Of course, I did. And it wasn't the easiest choice in the world. Once I would have done something stupid. Staked a claim, rampaged about, but that would have been all about me.”

Gwaine put down the bottle and picked up the glass Arthur had poured for him. He drank a good half of it. “So what, you've become all self-sacrificing?”

“No,” said Arthur, smiling in the general direction of Gwaine's now half empty glass. “I've grown up.”

“Okay.” Gwaine finished his wine and put the glass in the sink, all tidy. “So where do we go from here?”

“We try to get along.”

Gwaine drummed his fingers on the draining board. “All right, how about we try doing it over a film. My choice, of course.”

Arthur hated Topsy Turvy.

****

It didn't take a genius to guess that Merlin was trying something. 

Over the following two weeks Merlin tried to throw the three of them together as much as possible. 

That became clear after a pizza night Merlin invited him to that involved Arthur; an outing to Kew Arthur popped up for and countless other evenings out that featured Arthur in some form or another. 

Often Merlin would meet him alone and then phone Arthur, ask him what he was doing, get a 'nothing much' answer, and convince him to come down because Merlin and Gwaine were having a ball, were clubbing or just faffing around about town.

At first Gwaine pulled angry faces at being played, but he couldn't keep up being angry at Merlin for long. Not when he was met with huge grins, patting hands and lovely declarations of, “I just want you to think about something positive. Know you have us.” 

So he moved on to ribbing Arthur; but that too seemed to fall flat because Arthur refused to take the bait. He just said something clever in response and moved on.

All the while Merlin was in trouble with his boss over the days he'd taken off earlier that month. 

That night, and this had become a much more frequent occurrence, he was late to the pub. 

When Arthur's phone buzzed with an incoming message Gwaine knew it was from Merlin, explaining why he wasn't there with them.

Arthur chortled at his phone, looked up from it, and a certain something flared in his eyes, something Gwaine couldn't put his finger on. He turned and pushed his mobile towards Gwaine, who read:

_missed earliest train from B. will be UNSPEAKABLY late._

“I wonder if he's done it on purpose,” Gwaine let out.

Arthur pinched his brows together. “He's really getting fire and brimstone from his boss. He's just an intern, Gwaine. He can't do whatever he pleases.”

“Like you can...”

Arthur chewed on some cashews. “And you. Don't think I haven't noticed how your temp jobs get dropped all the time. How you flit from one to the other when you don't like the schedule. That's because you've got the money to play it like that.”

Gwaine winced. “Touché:”

“He's...” Arthur began, seemed to rearrange his thoughts for a while and then said slowly, “He has these big hopes and dreams, so I get why he's slaving for them right now. Not everything is about plotting.”

“I think the best of Merlin,” said Gwaine.

Arthur smiled when Gwaine had been expecting a grimace at the exclusionary turn of phrase. “I know you do. And the same goes for me.”

Merlin arrived two beers and two bowls of cashews later, huffing, red about the cheeks, and looking thinner than usual though as gorgeous as ever. As he bowled over to them, Arthur hurried to the door, gave him a big hug and fleeting kiss Gwaine wouldn't have credited with him pulling off in public, and dragged him over to their table.

Merlin sank into his seat, stole Arthur's beer and Gwaine's napkin and said, “Crap, it's almost closing time.”

Arthur had taken Merlin's hands under the table and was warming them. Having straddled the bench sideways, he'd completely turned in his seat so he was facing Merlin. “Hey,” said Arthur, “I can still beg a bit and get you a pint.”

“Be sure to pout,” Merlin joked. “You're kind of irresistible when you pout.”

Arthur ruffled Merlin's hair. Gwaine thought he should have been jealous at that; would probably have been a couple of months ago, but tonight he didn't have to deal with that burden. His heart wasn't breaking, he could breathe just fine and his mouth didn't taste like ashes at all and it wasn't because he felt any less passionate about Merlin.

Merlin turned towards him and said, all serious, “I want to be there for you more, but the logistics of it...”

Gwaine smiled, “I know that.”

“My boss wanted me to work on these relief maps on a flood control project and it's a big thing.”

“Merlin--”

“I can't muck it up but I don't want to muck it all up with you either.”

Arthur came back with Merlin's pint.

Having a look at his old battered wrist watch, Merlin lifted the glass up and started guzzling.

“Hey,” said Arthur, “go easy.”

“Five minutes to closing.” Merlin put the glass down, having drained a quarter. “I like Newcastle ale.”

“We can do this next week too, Merlin.” Arthur played footsie with Merlin under the table. Gwaine was struck by the thought that he was doing so that Merlin wouldn't drink himself under the table because he was in a hurry. 

When Arthur stopped engaging Merlin, Gwaine smiled into his own glass and shared a look with Arthur. 

When the pub owner took his broom out and starting piling chairs on top of the tables though, it became clear that they'd better go. 

They all filed out, Merlin looking cheery, knocking shoulders with both Arthur and Gwaine. “Did any of you get here by car?” Merlin asked as he trotted down the street. “That's because I'm angling for a lift.”

Gwaine said, “My bike's parked pretty close. We just need to take a short cut, that way.”

They turned a corner and wound up into the side street Gwaine had hurried along when getting to the pub. The street was narrow and slippery, smelt like cabbage and the pavement was so narrow as to be almost non-existent.

Arthur was saying, “What a crap short cut,” when they were accosted by three blokes who formed a circle round them.

Before any of them could do anything one of them flipped a knife out, saying, “We want your money, mobiles, everything you've got on you, now.”

Gwaine studied the three of them for traces of gun possession; if he just could find a way to know he wasn't carrying, he'd act, kick at the guy holding the knife first, tackling the others later, a time honoured strategy that had seen him through many a dire scrape.

As Gwaine revolved the idea in his mind, Arthur held a hand out, saying, “All right, calm down. We don't need a blood bath over thirty quid and three phones, right?”

Their aggressors started crowding in on them, whipping out knuckle rings and chains. Hell.

Merlin, like the peace loving but rather idealistic idiot he sometimes could be, stepped out in front of them, saying, “I hate; I absolutely hate violent bullies.”

Which was when Gwaine lost track of what was going on and started being scared as shit. One of their aggressors, six three, large about the shoulders and sporting a fair amount of bumfluff which advertised him as a rebellious teen, closed in on him. 

Quick on his feet, Gwaine ducked the upper-cut heading his way. 

Seeing as Gwaine was successful, the guy with the knife growled and sprung forwards towards Merlin. 

Under the cosh, Merlin stumbled. Gwaine kicked at his own opponent, trying to get at him. The blade flashed down towards Merlin.

Gwaine yelled.

In instinctive self-defence Merlin kicked viciously at the guy with the knife.

Then Arthur dove and then one of their attackers said, panic sharp in his tone, “Come on, shit, come on. You've killed him.”

When Gwaine got to his knees, Merlin was cradling Arthur, his left hand covered with blood. 

Arthur clawed for breath,gripping Merlin's wrist tightly. “You took that for me, you idiot,” Merlin said, and said it over and over again. 

Through chattering teeth, Arthur blurted something incomprehensible out and started shaking.

Christ, he was going into shock.

Gwaine called 999.

 

**** 

It was not until two days later that Gwaine saw Arthur. He looked like utter shit, had lost lots of blood and had undergone a transfusion by then. 

He was attached to a drip, a transparent tube meandering away from him and back into the drip's chamber, needle kept in place by a pristine strip of gauze taped down to his skin. The doctor had said, “He was lucky. A little to the left and--” 

Gwaine didn't like doctors and their platitudes. 

He liked Merlin being about to keel over out of sleeplessness and stress even less. And, if he was honest with himself, he wasn't much fond of the thought of leaving anyone alone to fend off a bunch of yipping doctors.

When Arthur saw him, he rasped out, “At least I don't have to fear getting more flowers from you.”

As a matter of fact, Arthur was surrounded by vases full of flowers. There was a little bit of everything; Gwaine recognised blue bells and violets, yellow roses and daffodils, daisies and cornflowers. 

A teddy bear hugging a pillow that said, “Get well soon,” was propped up against the tallest vase.

Gwaine strolled up to the bed, a hand in his pocket, the other jiggling his bike's keys. He sat down on a stool and said, “That from Merlin?”

Arthur turned his head to the side, following Gwaine's line of sight. His eyes fell on the stuffed bear. 

“Yeah,” he said, smiling in the way only a man who was both drugged and in love could. That look kind of lit him up; made him look good, despite the pastiness of his skin, the scabs around his chapped lips and the mighty circles under his eyes. It sounded like nonsense but it was also true. “He brought it this morning. Before he folded over at the foot of the bed and fell asleep.”

“You scared him.” Gwaine tapped his fingers on his knee. “Hell, you scared me and I've got enough brawl scars to last me a life time.”

Arthur chuckled, winced and resettled. “I see you can stop posturing from time to time.”

Gwaine pocketed his key, flicked his eyes across the room. “You did good, man. You did good.”

Arthur didn't reply to that.

“Not everybody would have done that,” Gwaine added, not even sure why he was saying that.

Arthur said, “I didn't even think.” He paused, moved his arm, fussing with the drip line, then resumed speaking. “I'd do it again.”

“You shouldn't.”

Arthur's eyebrows fused together. “Pardon?”

“You shouldn't try to pull of that kind of stuff.”

“I couldn't stand by and watch,” Arthur told him, voce level. “It's not me and it will never be even if it hadn't been Merlin. I can't condone that sort of violence. And then it _was_ Merlin.”

Gwaine nodded, chin jutting out. “He'd be devastated.”

Arthur turned his face to the window. 

“Arthur.” Gwaine sighed, rolled his eyes at the ceiling, and took to tapping his foot against the bed's little wheels rhythmically. “As much as it pains me to say this, you're all right, so don't be a pillock and throw your life away. We'd all be happier if you didn't try to out hero Superman.”

“Personally I think Batman's cooler.”

Gwaine said, “No way. The blood loss must have addled your princess on a pea brain.”

Arthur seemed to have borrowed one of Merlin's impish expressions, his eyes were dancing with teasing merriment. “You're saying that because you can't live with the fact that you admitted to liking me enough to want me to survive.”

Gwaine shot up on his feet, feigning an outrage he didn't quite feel. “Whenever did I do that?”

“Just now,” Arthur fired back but then he coughed and went a shade or two paler. 

Gwaine was in two minds about calling in a nurse but rethought the idea when he saw that Arthur had settled down and seemed okay now. “I think you'd better get your beauty sleep, princess.”

Gwaine heard him shout after him, “You're mixing up your fairy tales,” even from down the corridor.

 

****

They were at Merlin's, a view of the sea extending across half the room, slivers of moonlight seeping in, the street lamps outside casting orange patches of lighting on the floor.

Merlin switched off the telly when the titles rolled. He stood up, stretching. “You both liked it, didn't you?” he asked them.

Gwaine had loathed it; considering the alarmed look Arthur flicked him, Arthur was of a mind with him. He made a face behind Merlin's back. Gwaine tipped his chin against his chest and huffed a stealthy laugh.

Arthur rose, grabbed Merlin from behind and kissed his neck.

Gwaine followed him on his feet. He said, “I think that's my cue to go. London's calling.”

Merlin whirled around from within the circle of Arthur's arms. “Wait, no!” he said.

“Merlin,” said Gwaine, “it's midnight--”

“Whenever has that stopped you?”

“And you're clearly getting cosy and--” He stole a glance at Arthur, who looked way better than he had two weeks ago but could still use some comfort sex; he then glanced away to let his eyes fall on Merlin and take in his oddly hopeful expression, “And I want you lads to have fun.”

Merlin slid out of Arthur's grip and crossed over to him. He took Gwaine's hand in his and tugged. Gwaine's heart skipped a beat; as it naturally did each time Merlin touched him, but the diffused warmth that enveloped his guts was diluted by a sense of confusion. His eyebrow shot up. “Merlin?”

“I'd love it if you stayed,” he said. “With us.”

“What?” he squawked. 

Merlin reached his arm out to Arthur too. “I don't want you to go and neither does Arthur.”

Gwaine put two fingers to his forehead as if to stave off a migraine. “Wait, you're asking for what? Me to hold your hand...” His voice rose a little when he saw the heightened colour climbing up Merlin's neck. “You want us to have a threesome.”

“That should be nothing new for you.” It was Arthur who said that. 

Gwaine craned his neck to look past Merlin and at him. “And you're okay with that?”

“Gwaine,” said Arthur, “I would have objected if I wanted to.”

“But--”

Merlin kissed the corner of Gwaine's mouth and Gwaine flashed back to their night together, wanting to have it back like he wanted to breathe. Then Merlin tugged on Arthur's hand, moved aside, and pushed their heads together. Arthur's eyes were smiling with humour and the kind of self-assurance Gwaine would have strangled him for a few months ago. 

Kissing Arthur Pendragon was nothing he'd expected doing back then either. But the kiss was good, firm and involved Arthur's tongue in his mouth, his in Arthur's because Gwaine was good at rolling with it and never let it be said that he was a passive player. 

So he threaded his fingers in Arthur's hair and gave it his all, making it lewd and long and hard. He dipped Arthur too or tried to before Arthur stepped back and mock-kicked him in the shin, laughing freely, touching his mouth as though he was surprised he'd been snogged within an inch of his life.

It was Merlin's little laugh and moan, the two sounds mixed together, that drew their attention back to him. 

He'd popped open his jeans and the tips of his fingers were skimming his cock. “What?” he said his hand moving as he gave his dick short little pulls. “You're hot together. You are.” He gripped himself tighter, stroked slow, evidently surprising even himself with a rush of pleasure because his neck muscles bulged and his eyes widened.

Gwaine licked his lips trying to relieve their sudden dryness. God but that was hot. 

He shared a look with Arthur and then moved over to Merlin. He stood chest to chest with him and looked down. He couldn't fail to notice how the head of Merlin's prick peeked through the flap in his boxers. 

“Touch him,” Arthur said in a husky voice. 

Before he could weigh any of that in a rational manner, Gwaine's hands were inside Merlin's semi-open jeans, parting the slit in his boxers to find him hot and swelling, zip rasping on its way down. “Ah, you liked the show, didn't you?”

Within seconds, Merlin grew harder still. Gwaine pushed his jeans further down, cupped his cock, holding him firmly in his hand, then stroked his thumb along the length of him.

Merlin' eyes darkened.

A few quick strokes and Merlin was breathing through his nostrils, making noises low in his throat.

“Don't make him come,” Arthur said. “Not yet.”

Gwaine sidled closer to Merlin, murmured. “Do you want to move this to the bedroom? Do you want Arthur? Do you want to do me?”

Merlin's pupils were blown by now; he'd started leaking in Gwaine's hand. “A touch away, aren't you?” asked Gwaine.

It was Arthur's turn to make a pained sound.

Gwaine stepped away, holding both hands up, till he had an idea and licked at the droplet of Merlin's pre-come that had trickled down his index fingers. His audience seemed rapt.

Merlin pushed down his trousers and got his socks off. He looked rather fetching in his shirt and boxers, cock now pointing upwards and peering out of them.

“Definitely bedroom,” he said. “I want you both.”

“I'm on board,” Gwaine said. He got rid of his layers pretty quickly, ending up standing naked in the middle of Merlin's living room. Then he stalked up to Arthur, grinning a little ferally. “What about you, Arthur?” 

Arthur hadn't shed any of his clothing yet, but the tenting in his trousers told a tale of its own.

They resettled into the bedroom, a now naked Merlin undressing Arthur with a soft smile on his lips. As they kissed and nuzzled, Gwaine rifled Merlin's drawers for supplies.

By the time Arthur was naked and kissing a spot on Merlin's neck that made Merlin breathe fast, Gwaine had found both condoms and lube. 

“Got it,” said Gwaine.

Arthur looked up at him from nuzzling Merlin's neck. At Gwaine's spurring, he let go and knelt on the bed, cock standing at attention, torso completely flushed, pectorals firm, nipples stiff. He was a looker and knew it too. 

Gwaine chucked the lube at him while Merlin settled on his knees in front of Arthur.

“Why don't you slick Merlin up?”

Arthur grinned and Merlin sucked in a breath.

Gwaine watched as Arthur slipped two fingers inside him. Merlin let his head loll forward at that, biting onto his lower lip. “Arth--” he said but bit it off.

As Arthur's touch opened Merlin, Gwaine worked himself open too.

While Merlin rocked back, Gwaine pushed as many fingers inside himself as he could bear, wanting to join in, but waiting, because the spectacle of Merlin and Arthur itself was something he didn't want to miss. Who'd have thought that, once?

Merlin was flushing all over, torso, neck, face; he buckled into Arthur and thrust into his own hand,  
words dissolving into drawn-out little sounds that could have made Gwaine come all by themselves.

“Come here,” Merlin managed and Gwaine didn't need to be asked twice. He padded over to the bed, sat in front of Merlin and leant in to kiss him, lips on lips and tongue on tongue. 

Merlin was hot to the touch and he was so lost in a world of his own Gwaine wanted to blanket him and cradle him, kiss every inch of him till he was soothed.

Arthur was still knuckles deep into Merlin when Merlin moaned. “Can't take more or I'll come.” 

Arthur moved; grabbed the foil packet containing a condom, ripped it off and rolled the condom on. 

He was quick about it, but his hands weren't as steady as Gwaine would have thought knowing that he and Merlin had been at this for months. This should have been routine. But it wasn't, for neither of them. Merlin's expression when Arthur entered him was something Gwaine thought a thing of pure beauty, mouth parted, brows knitted, frown clearing up the moment Arthur thumbed at his foreskin. 

“Gwaine,” said Merlin, strained, a little bit gone, “want you too.”

As Arthur rocked, Gwaine sheathed Merlin's length in a condom, settled himself in Merlin's lap, guided Merlin inside him, balance a little precarious, although their acrobatics seemed to be working for now. And anyway he'd barter the initial awkwardness due to the positioning for the raw stab of pleasure he felt when the head of Merlin's cock pushed into him any day. 

Feeling almost light-headed, he worked himself up and down, helping out, because Merlin couldn’t possibly move him. 

Arthur's range of movement was limited too, for he was pinned down by their weight. Gamely, he wasn't complaining, rocking shallowly into Merlin, nuzzling at his neck, running his parted lips all over Merlin's nape and shoulders, working the blood to the surface as if it was his day job.

Gwaine sank down, Merlin’s full, hard length in him, let himself be speared through. He made it rough, made his pleasure climb, till he was close, so close he couldn't help but curse and say, “Fuck” and “God” and “Merlin”. 

Arthur grabbed him by the hair then, digging his fingers into his scalp, and smothered his curses with a kiss. Gwaine came.

He felt a little stupid, a little out of whack, and pushed off Merlin, who complained and worked his prick into his loose fist while Arthur, now free of Gwaine's weight, pounded him in short hard thrusts.

Gwaine took Merlin into his mouth to make up for leaving Merlin high and dry; gave him a hard suck and Merlin... 

Merlin trembled, thighs shaking, his orgasm gushing out of him in little spurts, coating Gwaine's tongue, and the side of his face and his collarbones when he decided he couldn’t swallow it all.

Like Merlin, Arthur came silently, the only indication he had, as viewed from the outside, was in the tightening of the muscles of the arm he had wrapped around Merlin and in the way his knuckles went white.

Rasping a stubbled cheek alongside Merlin's jawline, Gwaine said, “This was quite something wasn't it?”

“Care to repeat the experience?” Arthur asked as they all moved and resettled, taking up more comfortable positions.

“Is this a standing invitation?” asked Gwaine in a tone that made light of the question. “Because I--”

Merlin fitted his lips to his in a soft kiss. “Yeah.”

Arthur kneaded Merlin's shoulder and played with the dark whorls around Gwaine's nipples, tugging sharply when he said, “No, you see, you're just this big charity case we invited into our bed because we take sex lightly and--”

Gwaine batted off Arthur's hand. “Shut it, Pendragon. I'll take the offer into account.”

Merlin fell asleep drooling onto his shoulder and Gwaine buried a tiny lip twitch into his pillow.

 

The End.


End file.
